Life Insurance claims

When submitting your claim, please provide the following:

• Completed Life Insurance claim form
• Certified copy of the Death Certificate, Medical Attendant's Certificate or another document showing evidence of death
• Certified copy of evidence of the insured's birth certificate, passport or another formal document showing their age
• Certified copy of proof of identity for the person making the claim and their relationship to the insured.

We work collaboratively with families, loved ones, and legal and medical authorities, so we can access information and assess the claim as quickly as possible.

A certified document is a copy signed and stamped by an authorised person who has checked it against the original document. In Australia, a range of authorised people in your community can complete this, including Medical Practitioners, Legal Practitioners, Court Officials, Justices of the Peace (JP), Full-time Primary or Secondary School Teachers, Pharmacists, Veterinarians and Police Officers.

To certify your documents:

1. Make copies of the original documents. If you don't have a photocopier, most newsagencies offer this service
2. Take the original documents, such as your driver's licence, the insured's driver's licence or evidence of death and your copies to an authorised person to sight, stamp and certify your copies as true and original.

When we assess your application or claim, we may ask you to get examined by an independent medical specialist or attend rehabilitation.

We'll always try to organise appointments that are close and convenient to your home. If we can't find a suitable provider nearby and you live in a rural or regional area, we'll pay your reasonable medical appointment transport costs.

We'll also organise flights and accommodation for you to attend medical assessments if needed. If there's a medical reason you can't travel alone, we may pay the travel costs for someone to go with you. You'll need to approve this with us first to confirm what expenses we can reimburse you for. We're here to help you find a suitable solution.

To ensure there's disabled access at your medical appointment, please speak to your personal claims manager.

If the claim is successful, we'll provide an advance payment of $10,000. This is to help with expenses such as legal fees, or gaining Probate or Letters of Administration. The remaining balance of the sum insured will then be paid to the nominated beneficiaries.

We generally pay out Life Insurance claims within 48 hours of receiving completed claim requests. It may take a little longer if the bank account we're depositing into is a credit union or we receive your completed claim form and the certified documents close to a weekend or public holiday. It can also take longer if there are multiple beneficiaries, or if the policy didn't have a nominated beneficiary.

We understand it may be difficult attending medical appointments or obtaining documents in a set time.

That's why we'll work with you to agree on a reasonable timeframe. We'll also help you book your appointments and get the required documents to support your application or claim.

If we've requested information from you, we'll contact you to keep you up to date about the process. Remember to keep your personal claims manager updated on your efforts. We may close your application or claim if you don't meet the agreed timeframe.

If you need, please speak to your personal claims manager who will guide you through the process.

The best person to speak to is your claims manager, whose job is to know your case inside out.

If you have any questions or need help before you've been assigned a claims manager, please call us on 1300 996 143.

Generally, any payouts received from a Life Insurance claim are tax-free. Please check with your accountant to ensure this applies to your individual tax situation.

If an NRMA Life Insurance customer passes away or becomes terminally ill with a life expectancy of less than 12 months to live, we could provide:

• A lump sum benefit
• Free phone based trauma and loss counselling
• A $10,000 advance payout as soon as the claim is approved, to assist with legal costs in finalising the insured's estate.

For more details about what is and isn't covered, please refer to the Product Disclosure Statement (PDS).

This is the person that the claim payments are paid to when the claim is processed and approved.

If the policy doesn't have a nominated beneficiary, the claim is paid into the insured's estate and the claim will need to be updated with those details.

If the policy has a nominated beneficiary, but this person is now deceased, please contact 1300 996 143 to discuss options.

Any remaining people that are insured can continue to be covered under the policy. We'll change the policy to reflect the claim and send an updated policy schedule to the new policy owner. A primary insured may need to be determined if the current one is deceased.